


Holidays Across the Galaxy

by lesbomancy



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: Drabble Collection, F/F, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-24
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 02:12:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 3,066
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5521604
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbomancy/pseuds/lesbomancy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>A series of drabbles for my partner which were supposed to be tiny 500 word pieces for each of our main pairings in the Star Wars: The Old Republic timeline.</p>
    </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A series of drabbles for my partner which were supposed to be tiny 500 word pieces for each of our main pairings in the Star Wars: The Old Republic timeline.

“And Gerro Simms is ouuuut of the race!”

“... and probably dead!”

The vidscreen camera panned over to the smoking wreck of a podracer, the gran pilot kicking a crumpled sheet of protective plating from his pod’s control module. He threw his arms up, celebrating his evasion of death and the crowd went wild, cowbells and a variety of other noisemakers rattling off their support of the seven time loser of the Malastare Winter Grand Race. Several clunky pit droids ran to the gran and began to strip his pod clean, the gran holding his arm close to his body as he rushed across the track.

High up in the track’s VIP box Gaura whipped her head between the track itself and the viewscreen, the latter mostly to enjoy commentary from the twin rodian announcers; she always found the sisters more than a little entertaining despite how obviously they performed what amounted to theatrics to hype up the crowd. The Winter Grand Race was something of a tradition that she and some of her clansmen started when she was in her youth, a tradition that was passed down and across a variety of families. After five years of marriage Gaura managed to convinced Lanford to come out as well, the Mandalorian preferring a hard fight to sitting on her ass but with the Eternal Empire wandering their favorite haunts and fear at an all-time high she was able to see the need for relaxation… and what was more relaxing than people racing between methane vents and nearly exploding?

Briika joined in on the fun as well, the youngest of the Dekk siblings watching the race intently with her leg bouncing hard enough to make the whole couch vibrate. Gaura had herself draped across Lanford and the trio enjoyed all the high quality rich goodies that Malastare had to offer, which was mostly a collection of the finest vegetarian goods thanks in part to the Grand’s colonization of the planet thousands of years prior. The young Dekk chewed on a hard chip of some sort, her face scrunching up to show her displeasure at the texture.

“What is it?”

“Shit,” Lanford responded.

Gaura rolled her eyes at the both of them, “Vegcake. If you don’t like it then I’ll eat it.”

“I don’t like it,” Briika said as she slid the chip into her mother’s hand against her will.

The elder Dekk woman ate with much the same expression. “Unlike some people I am able to enjoy the fruits of another’s culture.”

Lanford grunted.

Another deafening rattle from the crowds underneath the VIP booth snapped the trio back to the race. Gaura nestled into Lanford’s chest and quietly whispered ‘I win,’ before kissing the Mandalorian. Briika stood up and screamed out in joy, punching the air as Jerika Briika’s podracer cleared the circuit line after her final lap.

Lanford grunted again, smiling as she embraced Gaura. Briika tore them out of their embrace with a loud clearing of her throat.

"Come on! We gotta go congratulate aunt Jerika!"

The pair untangled, Gaura grabbing her leather jacket to slip on. She offered Lanford her lightweight 'casual breastplate' as Briika zoomed about the VIP booth, gathering up her own outfit.

"Still not a fan of a quiet holiday?"

The rattle of noisemakers and the cheering crowd below made Lanford squint, "Yeah, but.. who says it was quiet?"

A large explosion prompted the two announcers going in-depth about what parts of the pilot's body went where, the viewscreen showing the flaming pod of a failed contestant already being stripped by the track's maintenance droids. Gaura turned to look at it, smiled, and pulled Lanford towards the door. Briika squeezed between the two and all but ran down the hall ahead of them.

 

"Okay.. not quiet but I wouldn't want to be anywhere else than with the woman I love."

 

Lanford grunted, smiling big at the word which was always so hard for Gaura to say. It came out effortlessly, organically.

 

"Yeah. Me either."


	2. Chapter 2

“You’re goin’ whether you like it or not, shit for brains. I’ll put corks on your fucking head and dress you up like a wookie if I gotta,” Donnelly spat on the floor of the elevator, a small mouse droid coming out from a nearby compartment to vacuum the glob of saliva up loudly.

“Whatever. Don’t expect me to play nice with the bitch.”

“Never expected you to. She’s got my dick in a vice, likes seeing the little credit symbols leak out of it like a goddamn faulty faucet or some shit.”

Hyal moved his hand to Donnelly’s inner thigh, the shorter man having a wicked grin plastered to his face. He started to talk before Donnelly cut him off.

“There’s-..”

“Yeah, yeah! I know! Better uses for my dick. I can’t help it if it’s a fucking commodity, like some goddamn fleshy as-seen-on-the-HoloNet shit. Everyone wants the melt in your mouth pleasure of a middle-aged man’s dong.”

Donnelly laughed to himself, which in terms of volume made most of the elevator’s paneling rattle and gave Hyal a slight ringing to his ears, the zabrak having covered one of them in preparation for his partner’s boisterous guffaw.

“You think you’re funny,” Hyal said with a smirk as he leaned into Donnelly.

“I ain’t the only one. Be as snotty as y’want, I see you smirking.”

Hyal rolled his eyes. The elevator dinged and the door’s opened. The Coruscant skyline looked brilliant during the evening and it was clean without being sterile, something that felt exceptionally nice seeing how neither of them had to pack a weapon like they usually did on Nar Shaddaa. Of course that didn’t mean that Donnelly wasn’t fitted with a sidearm or two, especially given that he was in uniform. The penthouse suite for ‘Admiral Anlon’ was just as opulent, a protocol droid guiding them to their assigned seating for the fanciful dinner.

It took more than a few years of convincing to get the zabrak to agree to something like this, especially since it was a test in sobriety. Old military buddies, family and all other sorts of odd people from various backgrounds spent their two minutes saying their hellos to Donnelly as they made their way to the table, more than a few of them clearly old flings who wanted to have a second taste for some ungodly reason.

As they sat down Donnelly threw his arms around two younger guests, teenagers looking to be between 14 and 18. The taller one, a gangly redhead, gasped excitedly and hugged Donnelly while the younger (or shorter one) barely put down his game long enough to hug Donnelly before going back to blasting Zaks in Empires Against Us, the hot new title which showed up in Donnelly’s purchase history as a gift despite his ex-wife forbidding anything remotely electronic for their kids.

Whether intentional or not it left no room Hyal to sit, at least not until Donnelly pulled up his son and swung him around to sit with his sister.

“You’re getting big. When you gonna start benching me?” He laughed.

From the looks of it he never would be able to, the marks of a sedentary life already etched onto his son’s body and demeanor. He wouldn’t want to but he smiled all the same and told his dad that he was too fat to lift. Laughter erupted from him once again before he leaned over to tousle each of their heads.

“Listen, eh, I got a friend here. Someone you should say hi to or whatever.”

Donnelly waggled his fingers at Hyal, the zabrak moving to their seat quietly.

“Be nice to him, alright? He’s a snarky little bitch but he’s on his best behavior, just like me.”

The kids waved, the red headed one introducing herself as Velicia and the other as Remin. Hyal did his best to be civil, to introduce himself as a regular person would. Remin ended up talking for once, his brows furrowed as he asked his dad if he WAS going to actually behave.

“So.. are you, like, what are you two?” Velicia asked.

The small table went silent for a bit, Hyal looking at Donnelly as he weighted his options and pressed his lip against the top of his mouth. He did that shift, the shift Hyal knew meant he didn’t know what to say. He worried about this, about Donnelly actually having to admit to someone other than himself that he was with a man. It always ended up the same way. ‘friends,’ ‘buddies,’ ‘pals,’ ‘work associates.’ He shouldn’t have given him a second chance, no matter how good it was at home, he didn’t want to be with a liar, the least of which a liar who couldn’t say anything meaningful to the people he supposedly loved.

He was about ready to storm out of the penthouse’s ballroom before Donnelly grabbed Hyal’s knee and gave it a squeeze.

“Yeah. He’s my boyfriend. What about you, any steamy encounters that I gotta deck for not being good enough for my soon-to-be speeder licensed favorite brat?”

The two kids took it as well as ‘the bathroom is over there,’ no visible reaction from either of them. Though they managed to talk a fair bit when Donnelly went to take a shit in the upper deck of his ex-wife’s toilets. All six of them.

It was a long night talking to the kids, though the kids wanted to know everything they could and Velicia was sufficiently sassy enough to keep up with Hyal.

Now all they had to do was not get kicked out, a task Donnelly always made complicated.


	3. Chapter 3

6AM. Norri rolled out from underneath the bed to do what he did best; deceive the ones he loved. He made sure that Salin hadn’t woken and that the house itself was still secure, no perimeter breaches or Zakuul listening devices anywhere. The neighborhood where they lived was of little interest to Zakuul and thankfully other than the Civil War being reignited the planet had enjoyed a moderate level of peace as the civilian non-royal populace did as they always did. Norri did his job well and when he could help those in his neighborhood he did, the Dekk household becoming something of the likes where you went to them if you had a problem, with Salin acting as a doctor in her final year of university and Dekk managing to find lost kids, persuade royalty to go easier on the little guy and… do less than luxurious things to keep the security of the neighborhood in good standing.

So it was uncommon these days for him to sneak around his own house, though this time of year there was more reason than the hundreds of days before that. He barely dressed in his pyjamas before he hauled five crates from the hall closet to the living room. A holo-tree was replaced by a real Alderaani pine, wrapped up and waiting outside his door by one of his new neighborhood friends. Lights, baubles and framed pictures of the family were thrown about the tree and the mantelpiece, bright white lights hanging in strands from the ceiling and walls as if to heighten the snowy world’s aesthetic. Two full crates of decorations riddled the house and he worked room-to-room until the entire downstairs was more festive than any year before.

He pulled out his datapad to check his time. 6:45AM. He had fifteen minutes left, fifteen minutes before his little project was unveiled and he was able to share it all with the ones he loved most. He hefted boxes large and small underneath the fresh-smelling tree, bits of tinsel and the occasional pine needle getting stuck on his person. Not many celebrated obscure holidays but since the invasion by Zakuul he saw nothing more important than his family. Picking each holiday at random (a Sullustan father’s day, an Ithorian planetary reverence day) he went to town with his own swing on everything, the most creative outlet he’d had in a long time since he gave up cover identities and the general act of espionage.

Life Day was obscure enough so that it would be easily out of their minds. They never knew what hit them, Keida and Zyren reacting almost always with joy and Salin… well, Norri always liked surprising her. He liked seeing her react, though half of the time it wasn’t just pure joy that motivated her. It seemed like she was proud that he was making good on his vows, his promise to not only her but the two children they were raising in a galaxy of uncertainty. It was good, feeling that she was proud of him. He managed to keep his edge after his professional fall and his personal life went into ruin, something that a good amount of his friends weren’t able to do after the war with Zakuul ended in a peace treaty born of fear.

6:50. The guests arrived early, mostly Salin’s family and some of his own with a smattering of work associates new and old, the ones that saved his life more than once. Ten people when it was all said and done with their own gifts, most of them happy to partake in a holiday Norri had spend almost four months planning. The family protocol droid cracked open the ready-heat containers of food he had made almost two days ago, the smell from each one as it transplanted onto a platter even better than when it was fresh. Caf, tea, and the kid’s favorite drinks… it was all coming together. He had the presents sorted, he even got his guests two gifts each along with their own full stocking. They were all family at this point, all people who knew the Dekk family intimately, people that everyone would be happy to see. Assuming that Salin’s mother was able to keep her mouth shut and her mother-in-law was able to keep her shirt on.

But this was a personal favor. Everyone behaved, Norri having nearly begged them each individually with all the humility he could muster. He wanted his girls to be happy, all three of them. Just this one time a year.. and as the door opened to Salin’s room and she was getting ready to head to her studies (which Organa intelligence cancelled. A favor he had earned) he heard her arguing with her holocom, angry that they waited until she was about to leave to tell her that classes were canceled for the day. He tore off his tacky sweater and rushed up the stairs to embrace his wife as she got off her call, the woman somehow managing to sound annoyed and pleased at the same time.

The glory in his plans were that none of them unfolded the same.. though as Norri convinced her to wait for the kids she knew something was up. Something was happening, especially since Norri never woke up the girls with such emotive pleasantness. She watched as he got them up with a smile, had them laughing by 6:56 and dressed by 6:59. He told them he had a surprise and brought the trio down to the door which led into the living room. He had it closed but the sounds behind the door were definitely something to be curious about, especially since music was playing. He put his back to the door and smiled at the three, the realization that he was doing one of his things sinking in.

The two green girls smiled wide as he opened the door and revealed the beginnings of his festive decoration, the lights along the halls coming to life as he muttered a simple ‘I love all three of you more than anything.’ The overwhelming about of stimulation from the people, gifts and decorations had them stunned for a long time but it wasn’t before long that the family from the far reaches of space shuffled forward and embraced the beloved Dekks in their own hugs and showered them with love. While it was always difficult for Salin and her mother to get along there was at least an admission of love before Norri craftily directed her to Kasea, the woman-who-listened-no-matter-what. Her father came, too, and the grandkids couldn’t have been happier for it. If it weren’t for his newly minted rattataki wife he would’ve spent the day entertaining them, going on and on about this and that. Gaura came of course, with Lanford and most of his sisters and his brother. 

Alluria was stuffy and rude but mostly happy to be included, most of the Briika clan putting her bad manners to shame with how they seemingly had a contest on how much they could hug their relatives, starring the Ra’vool-Dekk kids and their mother.

7:00 came and passed, the first hour being drink and food and happy stories. Gifts, games, vids and more stories came throughout the day until most of the guests had gone or retreated to the guest house for their lodgings. by 2PM Sal and Norri sat alone on the couch, Keida and Zyren playing one game or another in front of them, surrounded by boxes of toys and clothes which for the most part they were thrilled to have. All items Salin mentioned they’d like, all items he bought with the last of his remaining ‘bug-out money’ he kept for himself in case of emergencies.

They curled together, holding each other’s hands after an exhausting mini-vacation unlike anything they’d seen before. Fingers squeezed and her head lay against his chest, the two sharing successive contented sighs as they each closed their eyes and truly relaxed, the worries of the galaxy melting away as their kids argued about how overpowered the chromium gun was. They met in a bar like many couples but years later, almost a decade, and things were more peaceful and together for each of them then they ever could’ve imagined together.

Nothing could come between that, no manner of fight or break like they had in the past, their separation a distant reminder of a world that seemed entirely foreign. They grew, apart and together and they had become something beautiful, something everyone else saw.

Something worth keeping, for this obscure holiday and the million in the future. For every last one.


End file.
